Toby Harnden was the Daily Telegraph's US Editor, based in Washington DC, from 2006 to 2011. Click here for Toby's website. Follow him on Twitter here @tobyharnden and on Facebook here. He is the author of the bestselling book Dead Men Risen: The Welsh Guards and the Defining Story Britain's War in Afghanistan.

So farewell then, Fred Thompson

Full coverageÂ of the US Elections 2008Greetings from South Carolina, scene of Fred Thompson's last stand on Saturday. Well, not really a stand, more a half-hearted shuffle to his feet to concede defeat before the votes were in because he wanted to hot-foot it out in time to be tucked up in bed. That was the story of his campaign really he simply wasn't interested. Now he's officially dropped out.

Fred Thompson pauses during his final speech

If it's true that his wife Jeri was the one who pushed him into running, I'd hazard a guess there might be some friction in the Thompson household in the coming weeks. The Law & Order star came across as a decent old cove, the kind of solid, reassuring figure you'd like as a neighbour. He made some respectable debate contributions. But there was no real rationale for his campaign unless, as Fox's Carl Cameron suggests intriguingly, he was really running for veep. So who will benefit from his exit?

If he endorses his friend John McCain (the two were so close that McCain actually went on Thompson's honeymoon though whether there's bad blood because of Thompson's decision to run is unclear) then it could be a minor boost for the Arizona senator. Exit polls in South Carolina showed that a lot of his support came from social conservatives, who could now go to Mike Huckabee.

Mitt Romney and some analysts believe that the Fredheads will go to him. I'm not so sure. The best quality that Thompson had was authenticity he simply couldn't be bothered to pretend to be anything he wasn't, such as a candidate who really gave a stuff about any of it.

In his desperate clamour to pander and promise and suck up and change any policy to get elected, Mitt seems to me to be the unFred. Whereas Fred did nothing to get elected, Mitt is prepared to do anything. I'm not so sure there's much of a crossover there.

Truth be told, though, Fred doesn't have that many supporters to redistribute to Mitt or anyone else and many of them might, like the candidate, prefer taking a nap to doing something more active like voting..

Speaking of Mitt, I'll leave you with some of the most cringeworthy footage of a politician you ever see. Here's the Mittster on Martin Luther King Day complimenting a young black kid on his "bling bling" outfit and saying "Who let the dogs out? Who? Who?" instead of "cheese" when posing for a picture with today's urban youth. Enjoy: